hurrying across, with lowered eyes, to the sanctuary,
or back to their duties, with the hush of prayer still upon them.

In November Marcos received a letter from his father, sent by hand all
the way from the capital. Prim had re-established order, he wrote. There
was hope of a settlement of political differences. A king had been found,
and if he accepted the crown all might yet go well with Spain.

A week later came the news that Amedeo of Savoy, the younger son of that
brave old Victor Emmanuel, who faced the curse of a pope, had been
declared King of Spain.

Amedeo of Savoy, Duke of Aosta, was not a second-rate man. He was brave,
honest, and a gentleman--qualities to which the throne of Spain had been
stranger while the Bourbons sat there.

Sarrion summoned Marcos to Madrid to meet the new king. The wise men of
all parties knew that this was the best solution of the hopeless
difficulties into which Spain had been thrust by the Bourbons and the
tonguesters. A few honest politicians here and there set aside their own
interests in the interest of the country, which action is worth
recording--for its rarity. But the country in general was gloomy and
indifferent. Spain is slow to learn, while France is too quick; and her
knowledge is always superficial.

"Give us at all events a Spaniard," muttered those who had cried "Down
with liberty," when that arch-scoundrel, Fernando the Desired, returned
to his own.

"Give us money and we will give you Don Carlos," returned the cassocked
canvassers of that monarch in a whisper.

It was evening when Marcos arrived at Madrid, and the station, like all
the trains, was crowded. All who could were traveling to Madrid to meet
the king--for one reason or another.

Marcos was surprised to see his father on the platform among those
waiting for the train from the capitals of the North.

"Come," said Sarrion, "let us go out by the side door; I have the
carriage there, the streets are impassable. No one knows where to turn.
There is no head in Spain now; they assassinated him last night."

"Whom?" asked Marcos.

"Prim. They shot him in his carriage, like a dog in a kennel--five of
them--with guns. One has no pride in being a Spaniard now."

Marcos followed his father through the crowd without replying.

There seemed nothing, indeed, to be said; nothing to be added to the
simple observation that it was a humiliation for a man to have to admit
in these days that he was a Spaniard